MOBILE MEDICAL MARIJUANA DISPENSARY CITED BY CORONA, NORCO POLICE

The first thing people see when they step into a converted 1985 Pace
Arrow motorhome in Norco is a glass display case filled with
chocolate-covered cannabis cookies and medical marijuana labeled
"blueberry" and "cheese."

The collective has been on the road for seven months, but this month
its operators were cited by Norco and Corona police for possessing
drug paraphernalia and operating a dispensary, said Stewart Hauptman
and his wife, Helen Cherry, who run the collective.

The couple plans to contest the citations and challenge zoning laws
in the two cities that ban dispensaries.

The motorhome collective is parked at the center of a legal debate
over whether municipalities have the authority to ban collectives
despite a state law that permits them. Medical marijuana became legal
for medicinal use in 1996, and municipalities are permitted to
regulate them. But legal experts disagree over whether cities can ban them.

Legal experts are watching a state appeals case filed against Anaheim
by the Qualified Patients Association. The association argues that
the city cannot ban a collective because it conflicts with state law,
said Kris Hermes, spokesman for Americans for Safe Access, a
patient-advocacy group in Oakland.

Cherry said her August 2008 experience filling a medical marijuana
recommendation for chronic back pain in Los Angeles led her and
Hauptman to open the nonprofit Lakeview Collective.

The clinic she went to was less than appealing, she said.

"The paint was coming off the walls and (there were) bars on the
windows and no medical equipment to be found. I was like, what the
heck is this? This doesn't look legitimate," said Cherry, 60.

Six weeks later, she teamed up with two physicians to open Serenity
Medical Evaluations in Norco, where recommendations are written.

Patients then join the Lakeview Collective to purchase the medical
marijuana. The collective has about 700 members from the Inland area
and as far away as Las Vegas, Cherry said.

"We really want to take care of patients. We're not looking for the
18-year-old stoners," Cherry said. "We have people coming in
wheelchairs, in walkers."

William Sump, who runs a Riverside collective called the Inland
Empire Health and Wellness Center Medical Marijuana Collective, said
he knows of at least four similar mobile medical marijuana collectives.

Riverside County sheriff's Lt. Ross Cooper, who runs the Norco
station, said the collective is a sales operation, not a nonprofit
organization, so it doesn't meet state guidelines and violates
Norco's municipal code.

Norco City Attorney John Harper said the city is seeking a temporary
restraining order against what he said is a dispensary.

"We don't perceive what they do as a collective," Harper said. "They
sell marijuana out of a van."

Attorney Lawrence Bynum, who represents the collective, said it is legal.